Uncomfortable when it's close to home

There are so many Federal and State policies and practices out there, and of course, they are all intended to do good things. Maybe on the whole, they do. However, some of these leave a sour taste if they are reduced to the personal level. In fact, the "good things" the government tries to accomplish can become downright uncomfortable, close to home.

Our government spends a lot of money, and with a budget in the trillions, the numbers can become quickly incomprehensible. In fact, it's easy to lose all sense of perspective about the budget. Mr. Obama's proposed Federal Budget for 2011 would spend 3.83 Trillion Dollars; America currently has a national debt of $14,771,565,000,000. By comparison, the nearest star to the sun is 25.8 trillion miles away. To make sense of that, understand that a laser beam fired toward that star would take 4.3 years to cover that distance. Well, a Tea Party group has reduced the Federal Budget to an understandable level by reducing it to a proportionate household budget.

A household budget based on the Federal Budget would look like this:

Annual Family Income - $21,737
Annual Family Expenses - $38,188
Annual Additional Debt - $16,451
Recent Budget Cuts - $ 385

Current Outstanding Debt - $142,000

Does anyone think that a family with this proposed budget would ever be allowed to borrow that additional $16,451 in spending money? Even for the very best of reasons, even though the family "only" owes a modest $142,000, and even though the family is promising to cut all of $385 from the proposed spending, it hardly seems likely that any lender would not laugh them out of the bank when they ask for that $16,451 annual loan. Then also, there is that $142,000 outstanding debt. In housing purchases, a rough estimate for the maximum loan that can reasonably be paid back is about three times annual income. This debt is more than six and a half times the income. No rational mortgage lender would loan that. Of course, this is actually the government borrowing the money, and the full faith and credit of the United States is pledged against these debts. So, the situation is different. After all, a family might have trouble getting enough more income to repay that debt, but the government won't. If you pay taxes, you know where the government will go to raise its income, and that will hit uncomfortably close to home.

There's another one that hits pretty close to home. A Bake Sale being put on by the Berkeley College Republicans that has made national news. Why? Because the price of purchasing the product is based solely upon the race of the purchaser. The student group has styled this sale the "Increase Diversity Bake Sale," and the liberals are up in arms about it. One Professor even tried to buy all the products and end the sale, but the students refused. The Professor chided the students, saying she thought "Republicans were free enterprise, but they won't let me buy all the cupcakes." Nor should they; they're acting like liberals here, doling out the goodies as they deem best. The whole point of this sale is to protest an extension of Affirmative Action in California under CA Senate Bill 185, which will make race, ethnicity, and gender factors to be considered in California college admissions - despite a provision in the California Constitution which prohibits discrimination based on these factors.

The real question is why liberals would be offended by this little sale. The premise underlying the sale and our national policy of Affirmative Action are exactly the same - that people of certain skin colors have less ability solely because of their skin color, or less access to certain goods or services solely because of skin color. You would think liberals would be cheering this bake sale and promoting its adoption statewide, enforcing it in businesses and on college campuses, but instead they are offended. The External Affairs VP of UC Berkeley even went so far as to suggest that the sale is "harming the campus climate" and that these students should avoid being "purposefully offensive." Maybe the problem is that the "feel good" policy of Affirmative Action is too uncomfortable when it's close to home, because it shows Affirmative Action for what it is: discrimination.